The Calamity Club

Title: The Calamity Club
Author: Kathryn Stockett
Published: May 5, 2026 by Spiegel & Grau
Format: Hardcover, Pages
Genre: Historical Fiction

Blurb: In 1933 Oxford, Mississippi, Prohibition is on the wane, and the Great Depression is tightening its grip. Poor and rich folks alike have fallen on hard times, even as the old social order remains. For women on the margins, the options are few and the price of dignity and self-determination is unbearably high.

Eleven-year-old Meg, one of the unadoptable “big girls” at the Lafayette County Orphan Asylum, fights each day to keep her spirit unbowed. Birdie, unmarried and outspoken, has come to Oxford on a mission to ask her social-climbing sister to help the struggling family she’s left behind. And Charlie is a woman with a past, running low on luck but driven by fire, fury, and grit. When their fates converge, they come up with an audacious plan to take back control of their lives. Together, they form an unlikely sisterhood—but in a place and time where hypocrisy is rife, women’s freedom is fragile, and making an enemy can have dire consequences, will the price they pay for their outrageous risk-taking be too high?

The Calamity Club will make you laugh, cry, and cheer—an epic testament to resilience, friendship, and the fierce, funny women who know that calamity can be the spark of new beginnings. This is Kathryn Stockett at her most confident, heartfelt, and hilarious—the triumphant return of one of the most beloved storytellers of our time.

My Opinion: I’ll admit it: I almost walked away from The Calamity Club. The opening chapters felt dull to me, somehow muted, and not one character reached out and grabbed my attention. I kept thinking, Well, this is a shame, because I wanted to love it like everyone else. But I gave it one more chance and switched to the audiobook, and that’s when everything changed. Narrators Jenna Lamia and January LaVoy didn’t just read the story; they lifted and empassioned it. Their performances cracked the book wide open, and suddenly I found myself leaning in, invested, and unexpectedly moved.

Kathryn Stockett packs this novel with everything: heartbreak, humor, honesty, resilience, and those tiny human truths that sneak up on you when you’re not looking. Each chapter adds another layer, another emotional turn, another moment where you think, Oh, these women [yes, I am considering an eleven-year-old a woman]… what will they get up to next? And when the middle starts to feel a little long, like maybe the story is taking a breather, Stockett tosses in a new twist, a fresh head tilt, and suddenly I was right back in it, fully attentive and smiling at the audacity in these pages.

This novel ended up being one of the longest books I’ve read this year, and still, I didn’t want it to end. I found myself lingering, hoping, imagining futures for each of these women. I choose to believe they all found their happily-ever-after because after everything they endured, I couldn’t bear to picture it any other way.

Boundary Waters

Title: Boundary Waters
Author: William Kent Krueger
Published: June 9, 2009 by Atria Books
Format: Paperback, 352 Pages
Genre: Mystery
Series: Cork O'Connor #2

Blurb: Former small-town sheriff Cork O’Connor leads a desperate search-and-rescue mission into the unforgiving Minnesota wilderness in this “gritty, bloody adventure” ( Publishers Weekly ) from critically acclaimed author William Kent Krueger’s award-winning mystery series.

The Quetico-Superior Wilderness: more than two million acres of forest, white-water rapids, and uncharted islands on the Canadian/American border. Somewhere in the heart of this unforgiving territory, a young woman named Shiloh—a country-western singer at the height of her fame—has disappeared.

Her father arrives in Aurora, Minnesota, to hire Cork O’Connor to find his daughter. Cork joins a search party that includes an ex-con, two FBI agents, and a ten-year-old boy. Others are on Shiloh’s trail as well—men hired not just to find her, but to kill her.

As the expedition ventures deeper into the wilderness, strangers descend on Aurora, threatening to spill blood on the town’s snowy streets. Meanwhile, out on the Boundary Waters, winter falls hard. Cork’s team of searchers loses contact with civilization, and like the brutal winds of a Minnesota blizzard, death—violent and sudden—stalks them.

My Opinion: You know that feeling when you finally pull a long ignored book off your TBR shelf and think, Alright, today’s the day? That was my mindset going into this second Cork O’Connor novel. I read the first book so long ago that I forgot about Cork and felt it was time to check in with him again.

The experience ended up being kind of drab, more like a Sunday drive rather than the roller coaster I’d hoped for.

The opening is slow, to the point you begin to wonder if you made a wrong choice; then, eventually, the pieces begin to click into place, and suddenly you’re right there with Cork and Shiloh, moving through the wilderness and the tension and the secrets. For a while, it feels like the book is gearing up for something big. But instead of keeping the momentum, it settles back into that steady simmer. Not bad, just not the pace I was craving.

And because the book was published in 2009, it does show its age a bit. Not in a way that makes it unreadable, but you can feel the era in the dialogue, the pacing, and the way certain plot elements are handled.

One thing that stood out was the Native American storytelling woven throughout the narrative. Those moments felt alive and far more compelling, to the point that I found myself wishing the book leaned even harder into cultural richness.

By the end, the storyline had stretched itself thin. A few threads dangled without answers, and I wasn’t quite invested enough to chase them into future installments. Maybe they’re resolved later in the series, maybe not, but I’m not going along for the ride.

Still, I accomplished my goal: I read a book that had been sitting around for far too long. Sometimes that’s enough. Not every read has to be a revelation; some are simply a quiet checkmark on the list, a reminder that clearing the shelf can feel just as satisfying as discovering a new favorite.

If nothing else, Boundary Waters gave me a quiet few days, a bit of wilderness atmosphere, and a nudge to keep tackling those long waiting books. And for now, that’s good enough.

26 Beauties

Title: 26 Beauties
Author: James Patterson
Published: May 4, 2026 by Little, Brown and Company
Format: Hardcover, 341 Pages
Genre: Police Procedural
Series: Women's Murder Club #26

Blurb: SFPD’s Sergeant Lindsay Boxer's best friend, Claire Washburn, is named medical examiner of the year. But an uninvited guest crashes the Women’s Murder Club's party: a concerned father seeking investigative reporter Cindy Thomas’s help in locating his missing daughter. And she’s not the only one. Lindsay’s been investigating the deaths of a Jane Doe washed up on a nearby beach, and a young woman found in Golden Gate Park.

What if all these cases are connected?

My Opinion: I’ll admit, the first thing that caught my attention with 26 Beauties was the absence of Maxine Paetro’s name on the cover. After so many Patterson/Paetro pairings, seeing Patterson flying solo felt a little like walking into your living room and noticing someone moved the couch; familiar, but just off enough to make you pause.

Once I settled in, the usual cast was right where they always are: the Women’s Murder Club, their partners, their fellow officers. There’s a comfort in that continuity. The story itself is simple but flows well, helped along by Patterson’s trademark short chapters, the kind that trick you into saying “just one more” until suddenly you’ve read half the book.

This is one of those easy pick-up, put-down reads, unless you inhale it in an afternoon, which is entirely possible. It has that vacation-weekend energy: brisk, digestible, and not demanding too much emotional bandwidth.

What surprised me most was how much I ended up enjoying it. The last few installments had Lindsay Boxer drifting into the background of her own series, which always felt a bit wrong since she’s the heartbeat of these books. Here, she’s finally front and center again, and the story is stronger for it.

The courtroom subplot could’ve used a bit more weight, and Cindy Thomas’s storyline serves as a nice breather without overstaying its welcome. It’s just enough of a side thread to keep the pacing lively without pulling focus.

One thing worth noting: the subject matter is rough. Not graphic, but unmistakably dark beneath the surface. I was genuinely surprised the publisher didn’t include any content warnings, especially since the blurb keeps things vague. Readers will pick up on what’s happening, but a heads-up would’ve been considerate for those who would need it.

Overall, a better, more engaging entry than I expected, and a welcome return to form for Lindsay Boxer.

The Caretaker

Title: The Caretaker
Author: Marcus Kliewer
Published: April 21, 2026 by Atria/Emily Bestler Books/12:01 Books
Format: Hardcover, 295 Pages
Genre: Horror

Blurb: Macy Mullins can’t say why the job posting grabbed her attention—it had the pull of a fisherman’s lure, barbed hook and all—vaguely ominous. But after an endless string of failed job interviews, she's not exactly in the position to be picky. She has rent to pay, groceries to buy, and a younger sister to provide for.

Besides, it’s only three days’ work…

Three days, cooped up in a stranger’s house, surrounded by Oregon Coast wilderness.

What starts as a peculiar side gig soon becomes a waking nightmare. An incomprehensible evil may dwell on this property—and Macy Mullins might just be the only thing standing between it, and the rest of humanity.

Follow the Rites...

Follow the Rites...

Follow the Rites...

My Opinion: I went into The Caretaker fully prepared to say, “Nope, not for me.” Horror and I have an understanding: it stays over there, and I stay over here with my cozy mysteries and my sanity intact. And honestly, book recommendations rarely land for me. I’m never sure if it’s that people don’t quite know my reading quirks, or if they’re simply passing along what worked for them and hoping for the best. But every now and then, something slips past my defenses and pulls me in before I realize I’ve stopped breathing.

Well… this time, it worked.

I’m not usually a horror reader, but Marcus Kliewer had me from page one. My usual “let me give it a moment” turned into nine chapters plus the preface, which, by the way, is unsettling enough on its own to make you wonder if you should keep going or call for backup. The vibe is a little King, a little Koontz, and a dash of From (the TV show) sprinkled in for good measure. It’s that brand of horror where the world feels just familiar enough to lull you in, and then suddenly you’re staring at something so wrong your brain needs a minute to recalibrate.

This is absolutely a “read in big sweeping chunks” kind of book. If you stop, it takes a handful of pages to find your footing again, like trying to jump back onto a moving train. Make the commitment. Settle in. Accept that air is optional. And then join the ever growing “what the heck did I just read?” fandom. Also, side note, maybe don’t leave a depressed person in charge of saving the world. Just saying.

This was my first Kliewer novel, and to the folks who recommended it: dang, you did good. I may not sleep tonight, but I read the thing, and it’s going to stew in my head for a long while. I’ll be eyeing any future Kliewer books with a healthy dose of side eye, wondering if I’m about to be dragged into another creepy, terrifying ride where rabbits are omens and eye color determines who’s good and who’s very much not.

And honestly? I kind of hope I am.